My defiance is making the air taste like thick cotton wrapped around a probing stick and stuck in between my father and me. Which one of us will push it to cross these last ten feet? Whose face will be slapped this time? Without a moment's hesitation, my father aims and fires at me. An earsplitting bang blasts the air and hits me in the gut. As I fall, I watch two women descend the stairs, give me a quick glance, and saunter off. The sonic gun must hardly make any noise at all, not to their human ears, at least...I can't finish my thought. Ablaze with pain, I bend and fall, vibrating like a piece of glass about to shatter, seeing everything through a film of fog. My jeans catch on the sharp end of a chain link. I try to yank my leg free without breaking eye contact with my father, crossing that terrible bridge into the mind of the one who spawned me. A siren hunter without a soul. I fight the oncoming nausea.
"I said, I hate your guts. Did you hear me?"
"Good. I'm glad to hear it, sweetie. Now, would you please get in the car?" He motions with his gun. I detect nervous notes in his voice. I'm not, not running away, and that must puzzle him. It puzzles me too, but some mad stubbornness is making me stay, to test my theory. Plus, I can barely move.
"You're not going to kill me, are you? You can't. This is all for show," I say, slowly moving my stiff tongue, verbalizing something that's been bugging me since he first fired at me on Seward Park beach. If he wanted to dispose of me, surely he would've done it already.
Behind me, the passenger door remains closed and Hunter sits there quietly, his soul's Vivaldi now barely discernible. He's not getting out to help me. The air thickens with my resentment, I can almost touch it. Shaking, I get up until I'm kneeling, and I edge toward my father on all fours, dragging my limbs like an injured crab. I continue staring at him in the face, and I can see a trace of doubt. He frowns. Then my sleeve catches on another broken chain link and I fold down, digging into asphalt with my elbows and face.
Sprawled on the ground, I raise my head so I can see Papa.
"Go on, shoot me. I'm helpless. See, I can barely move."
And I flash him a grin. The terror that passes through his eyes is so genuine, that I burst out laughing. It shakes me to the core, sounding wrong and gleeful at the same time, releasing my fear into the open. I hear him curse.
Bam!
Another shot. It hits me square in the face, slapping me on my right cheek just as Papa always does. He'd then hit my left one, for symmetry, he'd say. To make me think about standing up to him, about growing out of my female weakness. I blink tears out of my eyes. The right side of my head is on fire; my right eye is close to popping and the right side of my jaw feels ready to part with my face. I grit my teeth and remain quiet, expecting the blast to my left. Nothing happens.
My father's silhouette swims against the staircase underbelly with pulsing regularity. I close my eyes and open them again, shedding more tears. Still no good. Everything around me looks as if it's covered with a layer of water. A gigantic, bronze bell tolls in my ears, ringing on repeat, echoing the shot. I suspect there must be some sort of intensity setting on that thing, some sort of a dial that regulates the wavelength or the focus of the sound beam, aimed at either torturing the siren or blowing her up for good. Because how else did he blow up Raidne with one blast from a distance of about fifty feet, yet he can't blow me up from only ten feet away? My mind clears up. Facts. Facts are my crutch and my sanity, they always pull me out. And water.
I try to turn my head toward the Puget Sound, to glimpse its blue expanse. No luck. My head drops on the pavement, my neck muscles twitching, exhausted. My nerves, assaulted by the sonic boom, feel detached. The last of my strength evaporates into a groan. I'm an escapee caught red-handed and awaiting corporal punishment. On sheer will, too stubborn to give up, I manage to roll onto my back and face the sky. But I don't see it. I don't see the street, I don't see the buildings. There is no highway exit above me, no clouds, no trees. Nothing. All is gone, replaced by Papa's eyes. Large, round, dark. They burrow a hole through me, and I flatten.
"I'm not coming home," I whisper.
"I can't hear you, sweetie." His shadow is above me, leaning closer. He doesn't hear me. He never hears me.
"Papa..." I can't finish. His eyes block the world, his black pupils consume my vision. I'm blank except for the constant ringing in my ears. The rest of me feels dead.
"Why don't you understand? You can't run away from me. I'm your father and you do as I say as long as you live."
"Then I don't want to live anymore," I whisper.
"Don't you ever say that," he hisses through his teeth and passes the gun to his left hand.
Here it comes, the symmetrical blow. His right arm snakes high into the air and pauses; for a moment, nothing more than a bent line drawn against the gray sky. Then it crashes down in one hard smack. The left side of my head explodes with a sound so deafening that I vibrate again to a bursting point, like I'm a balloon filled with too much water.
Everything goes quiet and dark.
I can't see, can't hear, but I can feel. My skull compresses, then rebounds with a shock of bright pain. I can't tell if it's cracked, but I'm still alive, as much as you can call a soulless siren alive. I feel Papa's hands on my neck, his fingers palpating, searching for a pulse. How ironic. I'm not alive, yet I'm not quite fully dead, either. I have a heart. It's pumping liquid through my veins, but that liquid is seawater. Cold, colorless, tasteless blood. No, not true, it has a taste. It's salty, like tears. Look who is crying. Ailen Bright, a siren, freshly caught, properly stunned and ready for purchase. At thousand dollars a pound, I'd say it's a steal. Except my father gets it for free, family discount, you know.
It's been a little more than a day now since I died and was born again. And I totally feel like a newborn in a fetal position, with my back bent, my head bowed, and my limbs drawn in toward my torso.
Papa leans to pick me up. The only other time he picked me up was probably when I was born. He must've been full of wonder, thinking he was getting a son. His hands full of love, cradling my head and pulling on my shoulders, to free me from my mother's womb. Lifting me and turning me over. Until...until he saw. That's it. I know why I didn't run away this time. Deep inside, I was waiting for this, I was planning on it, with all of my pitiful, dead heart. I was too afraid to admit it before, but now that I'm close to dying a second time, I'm not afraid anymore.
Papa, I can't help myself. I still love you.
This is my dream. My one minute of fantasy that's better than nothing, worth every ounce of pain, paid for with suicide. This very moment. This.
Papa wedges his arms underneath me and it's more intimate contact than I've ever gotten from him. He is rough, but to me, his touch is gentle. He lifts me off the ground in a sharp yank, but I think he gives me a first real hug. He jerks me up and folds me over his shoulder, but I feel like he cradles my body. He throws me into the trunk of his car, stuffing me in for perfect fit, but I imagine it's the car's interior he puts me in, simply a bit too dark. He ties my hands and ankles, and tapes my mouth. I phantom his face above me, smiling, worried sick for my safety, then buckling me up. He gives me one last punch, but I know he meant it as a kiss.
"What did I tell you? We're going home," he says.
The lid of the trunk shuts with a smooth clunk and my heart sinks. Darkness is complete, so is the soft silence. Papa presses on top several times to make sure it's really closed, then walks around the car and slams the driver's door. His steps, and the door's slamming, barely trickle into my ears. I feel them more than I hear them. There is a struggle, voices coming at me as if through a thick, wooly wall. I'm surrounded by hushed white noise, then it's silent again. The car trunk must be soundproof to some degree, maybe designed to transport captured sirens? I wiggle my wrists in an attempt to free my hands. Forget tape. What I feel is metal rope. There's no way can I break it, not without my usual strength. I grunt, trying to roll onto my back, but there's not enough space. I begin inching toward the back of the trunk, to hit it with my hands and touch it. The chemical smell of glue and some kind of rubbery foam starts irritating my nostrils. Great. What I need right now is a runny nose. I convulse in a soundless sneeze.
Like a distant echo, I make out the timbre of Hunter's voice, he seems to be arguing with my father. There are no words, only the sharp tone of their squabble, thick with emotions—suppressed anger, hatred, disgust, even arrogance. Then one remark from my father and silence again. I wonder what it is that he's said to shut Hunter up. It's not an easy thing to do.
The car purrs to life, backs out of its parking spot to turn around, and moves at an increasing speed, thrumming slightly.
That's it, I've been caught. Good job, Ailen. Prepare for your final execution. Isn't this what you wanted? You wanted to die, right? Well, here's your chance.
I swallow, tasting glue from the tape. It's been several minutes now that I've been locked inside, and it's increasingly difficult to breathe. The air grows warm from the working engine, and exhaust fumes trickle in through whatever gaps they can find, choking me with their gasoline smell. I'm on the verge of blacking out again. Prompted by the car's rhythmic motion, and the soft padding and darkness, I try to distract myself by imagining being back inside my mother's womb; imagining what it felt like. And missing her, missing her badly.
I wish I was never born.
I wish I was frozen in time, as a fetus, feeling this safe and warm and dreamy, always.
I pretend that the motor revolutions are her heartbeats, the stuffy air her amniotic fluid soaked into the lining of the trunk. The metal wire coiled around my wrists and my ankles is her misplaced placenta. Every bump in the road shakes me, her gestating embryo, but in a gentle swaying manner, the way a boat sways in the middle of a lake.
The air resembles a poisonous gas now, thick with a synthetic and metallic odor, and getting hotter by the minute. Dizziness spins my head. I can't tell up from down, left from right, or in from out anymore. It doesn't matter, I go on pretending I'm deep inside my mom, a properly developing baby. Ailen Bright, oxygenating normally, ten fingers, ten toes, two lungs, one heart.
For whatever reason, I imagine that it's when my parents were in Italy on their honeymoon, in Lake Garda's amusement park that my mom told me so much about. I must've been no more than a few multiplying cells at the time. They're going down a huge water ride, and Papa is scared out of his mind because he hates getting wet, even though he's strangely attracted to the water. But my mother insisted they ride, because she loves boat rides so much. When they met, she jokingly told him that she'd marry him if he bought her a boat. He did. She told me he fell in love with her like a madman. They married three weeks after that, and now I'm in her belly, swaying.
She jeers and laughs, soaking wet, and is clutching Papa's hand tightly. Papa is white, like paper. My mother is too absorbed in her enjoyment to notice, her heart going crazy like a revving motor. I know, I can hear it from the inside.
Mom? I'm a brave little girl. I swear I won't tell Papa that I'm not a boy. Promise. I feel her turning her gaze inward, suddenly knowing that she's pregnant, sending me a stream of warmth and endless admiration. The ride ends and they climb out of the boat, stepping down from the platform and into the Italian sun.
"Roger? I just felt something, on the ride. Some sort of a vision. I think I'm pregnant," she says and smiles at him. "And I think it's a girl. It's going to be a beautiful baby girl." She places a hand on her stomach.
"Do me a favor, Tali, stop it," Papa says, visibly irritated and still shaken by the ride. His face is gray, and his shirt is wet, sticking to his chest, almost transparent. "Stop talking nonsense, all right? You'll jinx it. I want a son, remember? You'll give me a son. And that's the end of it." He grabs her hand and pulls her out of the sun, and into the shade.
Deep inside my mom, I recoil and float into the farthest corner of her womb, not knowing anymore where my future heart belongs, crying nonexistent tears, covering up my face that I don't have yet with hands that are not there.
For a moment, my mother is speechless, following him like a puppet. Then, proceeding with her soft diplomatic nature, she tries to soothe him, discounting his remark to jet lag and a fast ride that perhaps made him ill. That's what she always told me; she was constantly trying to find an excuse for what he said or did.
"How can you say such a thing? So what if it's a girl, we'll try again. I know you want a boy, Rogie. I know." Her eyes widen, so blue and beautiful and dreamy. Her brown hair contrasts with her white skin, glistening even in the shade of a tall maritime pine. She attempts to touch my father's cheek, but he pushes her hand away.
"I don't want to talk about this anymore. Let's get out of here," he says.
"Are you feeling all right? Do you want me to get you a bottle of water?" She raises her hand again, then drops it. "You might need to—"
"Don't tell me what to do, woman," he says harshly, gripping her arm right above the elbow and pulling her behind him, weaving his way through the tourist crowd. They had their first fight in the hotel room after that. Mom wouldn't tell me what happened next.
I've imagined this scene a thousand times, and I had told this story a thousand times to Canosa and her sisters while sitting in the bathroom, crying.
I won't cry right now, though. I won't.
But I do.
They're cold siren tears; excess seawater excretes through my tear ducts at an alarming rate, wetting my face and getting absorbed into the wooly soundproof lining of the trunk. If I don't stop, I'll be swimming in this cry fest soon, all hot and swollen, my gills aching from the dry, stinky air, and my lungs suffocating.
My one minute of fantasy is over, and I have nothing. Forget the womb, this is a coffin. I'm going home, slated for slaughter.
A sense of dread spreads through my ribcage, as if something horrible is about to happen. I'm not afraid to die, I've thought all about it for years and years, ever since mom jumped. But something is brewing inside of me.
My father and Hunter ride on in silence. The car speeds along what must be Aurora Avenue, toward Raye Street, the street I grew up on. The engine pistons its steady rhythm and the tires pull at gravel, spinning and wheezing. Traffic hums over the distant drone of human souls packing the highway. They're all going somewhere, worried about being late; late to find their graves, every minute closer to the end, in the throes of this constant human dilemma. How to escape death, while pretending it's not there. If only there was a magic pill to swallow. And there is. It's called keeping busy. And they do. Like a chorus of atrophied puppets no longer led by a puppeteer, moving their limbs and sauntering through life, stumbling around without direction. They resemble one big, spoiled cacophony, except for Hunter's soul. His is a sweet note, so warm; warm like a home should be, warm like hands can be, and warm like someone who knows what being warm means.
Warm. Like I'll never be.
I can barely hear his melody through the trunk's lining. I try to stay mad at him for not helping me, but I can't. Instead, I want to hold his hand, to dive into the memories of games we used to play, music we used to listen to, and things we used to talk about when we were stoned out of our minds, happy.
Have you ever been truly, ravenously hungry, Hunter? I want to ask. Hungry for a love you can never have. Have you?
Shedding water through my skin because of the increasing warmth, I manage to worm myself closer to the back of the trunk. I tilt my head and press my ear into its synthetic lining. It tickles me, but I stay put, listening to the muffled echo of their conversation. I was wrong about them not talking. They are talking, and they're arguing at that.
"You don't understand. She's my friend. I can't do this to her. She's..." Hunter's voice catches at the end and I can't make out the rest.
"A siren, your friend. I see." Papa talks in that calm manner that I know too well. Listening to him is like breathing stiff air, waiting for the sky to open over your head into one downward gush of pouring anger.
"She's not just any siren. She's Ailen. Ailen, your daughter!" Hunter says with fervor.
I hold my breath.
"Help me understand something. You're a good looking kid. There are hundreds of normal girls out there. Why are you so fixated on the one who will snuff you out like a lightning bug, without so much as a second thought?" Papa says. Not even a smidge of a mention about his daughter. I don't know why I held my breath to begin with.
"That's a load of bull crap!" Hunter is nearly shrieking now. "She would never do that!"
"I'd appreciate it if you kept your voice at a lower level. Please." There is barely contained anger beneath my father's politeness.
"I'm sorry," Hunter says. I can't hear it, but I can sense his heavy breathing.
"I'd also appreciate it if we followed the original plan, like we agreed. You know I don't like repeating myself, so I'm going to say it one more time. One time only. I'm your boss, Hunter. I pay you to do your job. You listen to me and you do as I say." Pause. "That thing back there is not Ailen anymore. It's a siren—a clever, undying whore. The worst of its kind. When she's hungry, she'll murder anything living, even a newborn. It makes no difference to her, because she has no feelings. I pay you to kill the likes of her. Are we clear?"
Silence. I can't draw a breath. His words punch me in the gut like a fist.
"Are. We. Clear?" he asks again.
"Yes, Mr. Bright." Hunter answers so quietly, I can barely hear him. And then he keeps talking under his breath. "She's not a whore. Why would you call your own—"
The car comes to a sudden halt, tires screeching against brakes.
I wince as the inertia presses me into the scratchy lining.
"Silence!" My father bellows, his anger erupting. "Did I say I care for your opinion? Mine is the only one that matters here. All women are whores, better brandish that now onto your naïve, adolescent brain."
A few cars honk impatiently.
"But—"
"Did I give you permission to talk?" This Papa says more quietly, getting a grip on his anger. I think I'm getting a glimpse into what their afternoon talks must've been like, held behind closed doors in Papa's man cave behind the garage, where women were forbidden. Where Hunter would be invited as a special guest once in a while, after he'd come to visit me. My father would steal him for hours, under the pretext of educating my friend and giving him some much needed fatherly support.
Another honk. The car idles softly.
"You don't need to do this, Hunter. Any of this. You're free to go. Right now, if you want. I'll drop you off myself. Go tell your mother she can't have her drugs. I'm sure she'll be glad to hear it."
The silence thickens.
"If I stay, can we still stick to the original plan?" Hunter asks.
"Yes."
"I'll stay then."
"Good." Pause. "Oh, one more thing. What do you think women were made for?"
"What? What do you mean, made—"
"Answer the question."
I dig my fingernails into the lining, wanting to rip it out. This is my father's favorite question to torture me with.
One driver behind us seems to have lost his patience, honking repeatedly and then letting out one long, annoying blare.
A soft, rolling purr follows, and my father yells, "Shut the fuck up!" before rolling his window back up. The car rushes around us and off into the distance, as if upset and hurried.
"Well?" He is back to being calm, as if shouting helped. I know what he's doing, it's his favorite game. He's setting up Hunter to trip, to guess wrong, to stumble on an answer so Papa can wait one dramatic pause and be right. About everything. Always. Nothing in this world exists without him having an expert opinion on it. He'll tell you what to do and prove you wrong in case you try to argue.
An image of spit flying from his mouth startles me, flashing through my head. His flaring nostrils and his bulging eyes wedge under my eyelids into a horror movie I don't want to see but am unable to turn off. Mesmerized. Terrified. I squeeze my eyelids shut, hard. Go away, thought, go away!
"I don't...I don't know, Mr. Bright." Hunter's defiance is gone, his voice is flat and lifeless.
"Listen to me, son."
I attempt to burrow my head deeply into the scratchy lining, wanting to roll away so I don't hear anything. But I hear every word.
"Listen to me and learn. Women were made to haul water. They're weak by nature, weak and promiscuous, and we have to teach them that it's no way to live. Work them. Work them hard, or they'll swing their lusty eye at you, charm your pants off, and wrap your little cock around their fingers before you know it."
"What's this got to do with anything?" Hunter blurts.
"Did I say you could talk?" Papa asks.
Long silence.
More honks. Papa finally decides to get out of the way and pulls over. He pulls on the handbrake, leaving the car to idle. My fingers hurt from curling them too hard. The trunk's synthetic stink mixed with the smell of gasoline is overwhelming. I hyperventilate, getting dizzy, drowning in hot air.
"I'll explain. Not all of them, but most have whore DNA. You can detect it in girls as young as five. It's in their gaze. The way they look at you with their seemingly innocent eyes, little whores in the making. The way they talk, the way they walk. They flip their hair, and swing their hips. Every man wants a piece of a girl like that. Those are the ones who typically get turned into sirens. Whores attract whores. Are you following me?"
"I heard you say this before," Hunter says thickly.
And, suddenly, I know where his siren explanation came from, the one he gave me yesterday in the bathroom. I want to puke.
"Please. Simply answer my question."
"Yeah, I'm following." There is reluctance in Hunter's voice.
"Good." The strain in Papa's voice gives way to a lighter tone. "You see, if only it was about the flesh...but, no. They corrupt our very spirit. Steal our very souls. It's our duty to root them out, to clean up this filth, to let our spirits shine again, untarnished. You hear what I'm saying?"
"Um..."
Papa is on a roll, I can tell. He doesn't wait for Hunter to answer. "You think I like my job? You think I enjoy doing it, is that what you think?"
"I didn't say nothing," Hunter retorts.
"Ah, but you thought it. What you don't understand is the subtle difference here. It's not a question of want, it's a question of must."
Pause.
"What if I don't want to?"
"Then why the fuck did you agree to take this job?"
"You said it'd be easy. You said it'd be like shooting beer cans. No one told me I'd have to kill my best friend!"
"Well, no one told me I'd have a daughter when all I wanted was a son. How is that for disappointment, tell me?"
The rest drowns in my humiliation. I want to shrink into a fleck of dust. Shame for my own gender burns me to embers. I'm nothing. I hate my body. I want to cut off my newly acquired breasts and throw them into the bushes, leaving them to rot. My uterus, I want to cut it out too. Then, whatever is left of me, I want it to cease to exist. Where is that button, if I could simply press it. And I know. The sonic gun. I need to steal one and just kill myself for good.
Out.
I want out of this life.
As if it heard me, ready to help, the car starts moving.